Ivy Bridge vs Sandy Bridge @ 4.8GHz Quad-Core CPU Showdown

We do a quick runthrough of benchmarks tests @ 4.8GHz on the new 22nm "Ivy Bridge" Core i7-3770K (Retail E1 Stepping) against the nearly 1.5 years old 32nm "Sandy Bridge" Core i7-2600K, and then give some useful consumer advice at the end.

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We ran our benchmark tests at 4.8GHz as it is the average core frequency that is achievable by both the microarchitectures on air cooling.

CPU Benchmarks:

Recommendations / Lessons:

Clock for clock, Ivy Bridge (which is a "Tick" on Intel's roadmap) does offer performance improvements over Sandy Bridge, albeit mostly in single digit percentages. This is good news as the new processors will directly replace the old ones at roughly the same price points.

From the large pool of CPUs that we have tested/binned, Ivy Bridge uses 25% less power on average clock for clock due to the lower voltages required (in this case Sandy's 1.48v to Ivy's 1.27v).

Ivy Bridge's on-die temperatures (TJ Max of 105 degrees celsius) are a lot higher than Sandy Bridge, indicating possible high electrical leakage on the new process or a different measurement method. Note: Temperatures != Power, although there is some correlation.

Ivy Bridge is a (subzero) overclocker's wet dream, able to hit core frequencies near 7GHz with no cold bugs (unless motherboard induced).

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